German Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 101 58 732 A1 discloses a drive element for a water pump in a cooling water circuit of an internal combustion engine having a drive wheel and a shaft which is coupled to the water pump. In order to transmit torque, an electromagnetically actuatable friction disk clutch and a second clutch device in the form of an eddy current clutch are provided between the drive wheel and the shaft. The eddy current clutch entrains the shaft if the friction clutch is disengaged. With a unit such as this it is possible to cope with the regularly occurring operating situation in a modern cooling system for internal combustion engines.